


Allowable Losses

by Nightdog_Barks



Category: House M.D.
Genre: Accounting, Awkward Conversations, Conversations, Friendship, Gen, Taxes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-04-26
Updated: 2007-04-26
Packaged: 2017-10-18 08:24:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,893
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/186903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nightdog_Barks/pseuds/Nightdog_Barks
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's tax time, and House's receipts are a source of wonder to Wilson.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Allowable Losses

**TITLE:** Allowable Losses  
 **AUTHOR:** [](http://nightdog-writes.livejournal.com/profile)[**nightdog_writes**](http://nightdog-writes.livejournal.com/)  
 **PAIRING:** House-Wilson, strong friendship  
 **RATING:** A very soft "R" for some of the subject matter.  
 **WARNINGS:** None.  
 **SPOILERS:** No.  
 **SUMMARY:** It's tax time, and House's receipts are a source of wonder to Wilson.  
 **DISCLAIMER:** Don't own 'em. Never will. Also do not own any part of any of the products mentioned in this fic, nor do I own any part of The Beatles, from whose song _Taxman_ the LJ cut is taken.  
 **AUTHOR NOTES:** Just a little story -- not dark, not angsty. No one dies, is killed, or maimed in any way. I know -- how can it be a Nightdog story? There are a few source notes at the end of the fic.  
Thanks as always to my incredible First Readers, who _always_ make each story so much better.  
 **BETA: Silverjackal** , who said "Fits and starts."

  
 **Allowable Losses**

 _On a quiet April weekend ..._

  
Wilson stared at the battered Nike shoebox that House had just dumped unceremoniously in his lap.

"What's this?"

House sank a little deeper into the couch cushions and started flipping through the TV channels.

"Open it and find out," he suggested. Noting Wilson's hesitation, he rolled his eyes. "Don't worry, nothing in there's going to bite you."

Still, Wilson was cautious as he lifted the top off the cardboard box. He frowned. The box was filled to the brim with small pieces of paper. Crumpled paper. Torn paper. Some of the paper even looked like it had been set on fire and then hastily stomped out with a muddy boot.

"It's -- a box of confetti."

"Receipts."

"Receipts?"

"Is there an echo in here? Yes, receipts. I want you to go through those and tell me which ones you think I can legitimately claim."

Wilson stared at him. "House."

"Yes?"

"House, please tell me you've done your taxes."

House waved the hand that wasn't holding a beer in a dismissive motion. "I've done 'em," he said. Wilson continued to stare at him.

"Most of 'em," he amended.

Wilson put his head in his hands.

"You haven't even started, have you?"

"Technically?" House considered the question. "No."

Wilson fell back into the couch. "Oh, God. House, they're due _Tuesday._ Today's Saturday. Do you know what that means?"

"You need to start looking at those receipts right now?"

Wilson gritted his teeth. "House, the I.R.S. is not a government agency that is easily amused."

"Will you relax? Christ, you're worse than Chicken Little. The sky is _not_ falling -- we'll call your accountant Monday morning and get her to file for an extension. Or something."

Problem solved, House thumbed one of the remote control's buttons. The volume level of the TV increased to that of a low-level earthquake.

Wilson sighed; sometimes even when House was only partially right he was right. Resigned to the task at hand he pulled out one of the slips at paper at random.

 _"Horny Sluts in Hot Leather,"_ he read. "House, what the hell is this?"

"Magazine," House replied. "Use it for research."

"What _possible_ research could you use a magazine like that for?"

House leered at him.

"Never mind," Wilson said hastily. He picked out another receipt. This one was crumpled. He smoothed it out and peered at the miniscule blue printing.

 _"Supreme Reggie Rat Diet. 3 @ 5.69. Bobby Ray's Weed, Feed & Fertilizer."_ He pawed through the box; there were at least a dozen more of these receipts.

"House. You can't claim Steve McQueen's food as a deduction."

House didn't look around. "Why not? I'm claiming _him."_

"No, see -- you can't do that. He's a _pet,_ and besides, he'd need a Social Security --" Wilson stopped. A sudden, horrible thought had popped into his head. "You didn't," he groaned. "You got Steve McQueen ... a _Social Security number?"_

"Had to, Jimmy," House replied. "Couldn't claim him otherwise."

Wilson stared at him for a long moment.

"I don't want to know about this," he said finally.

"Fine. You don't know about it. Feel better now?"

"Not really, no."

Holding the receipt at arm's length as if it were radioactive, Wilson carefully set it aside and returned to the box.

It soon became apparent that there was more in the shoebox besides paper. Leaky ballpoint pens littered the bottom, staining Wilson's hands blue and black and red as he lifted them out and dumped them on the coffee table. Gleaming glass and agate marbles skittered away from his questing fingers. Wilson picked up one particularly beautiful tigerseye and gazed deep into its velvety brown and gold depths. There were stray shirt buttons and lapel pins, paper clips and pink India-rubber erasers. Wilson fished out one of the lapel pins. On it, a balding, stern-faced man stared back at him from an American flag background. _Adlai's Our Man!_ the legend proclaimed. _A New America in '56!_ All of it went on the coffee table with the leaky pens. One of the marbles escaped, careening off the edge of the table to fall to the floor with a tiny thump. It rolled under the table and disappeared from sight.

Wilson narrowed his eyes but House steadfastly refused to look at him, and with a sigh he plunged back into the mess of tattered paper.

He found what appeared to be receipts for heating pads and icepacks, anti-inflammatories and analgesics. There were even a couple of bills for new canes. These he carefully arranged in a single pile, mentally labeling it "Medical." Everything else he was putting in a second pile, one that he thought of variously as "Smut," "Perversion," or simply "House," depending on what was on the receipt.

Wilson really wasn't surprised that the second pile was rapidly approaching the size of a small-scale version of Mount Everest. He picked another receipt out of the box.

 _"Carmen Luvana Inflatable --"_ Wilson closed his mouth as he read the rest of the description. "A ... _Love Bullet egg vibe?"_ he said faintly.

"Don't knock it till you've tried it, Jimmy," House replied cryptically. Wilson looked at the receipt again.

"One hundred twenty-four _dollars?"_

"And worth every penny." House reached out and shifted the box into his own lap. "Hey, I've been looking for this!" He held up his prize: a single Vicodin. "Were you scared?" he crooned to the small oblong pill. "It's okay now, come to Papa."

It was Wilson's turn to roll his eyes.

"House, not only is that tablet covered in dust and paper lint, it's probably lost its potency a long time ago. Kind of like you."

House clutched at his chest.

"I'm _wounded!"_ he cried dramatically. "Speaking of which ..."

He set the pill on the coffee table and fished in the box again.

"Here ya go," he said. Something small and golden glinted between his fingers, and it took a moment for Wilson to realize it was the copper jacket of a spent bullet. Wilson stared at it.

"House." Wilson's voice was suddenly a little raspy, and he cleared his throat. "That's not -- you didn't keep --"

"What? Oh. Nah, it's from one of my dad's old guns." He regarded Wilson intently. "You thought I'd kept it," he mused. "Dude, that'd be really messed up."

"Yes, because you're such a model of normalcy," Wilson replied dryly.

House ignored him. "That would be like Ahab carrying around a whale tooth. Daedalus holding onto a feather. Jean Valjean and a moldy loaf of bread. The _Titanic_ and --"

"House. Can we just finish this?"

"Fine," House sulked. He plucked another piece of paper from the shoebox and unfolded it carefully. "Think they'll allow this?"

"What is it?"

House frowned. "I can't tell. What does this look like to you?" He shoved the paper in Wilson's face, an inch from his nose. "Heroin? Handcuffs? Horses?"

Wilson grasped House's wrist and moved the paper away just a bit so he could actually focus on it. He noted absently that House's pulse was strong and steady under his fingers, and squinted at the receipt.

"While I wouldn't put it past you to actually buy a racehorse, this appears to say ..." He squinted further. "Horseradish? A _case?"_

"Oh!" House pulled the receipt back. "Yeah, now I remember. _Wasabi Horseradish Hot Sauce."_

"A _case?"_

"Y'know, you look just like a guppy when your mouth opens like that. I was gonna leave 'em in the stockings over in Proctology last Christmas." House shrugged. "Never got around to it."

"You mean there's still _a case_ of horseradish sauce somewhere around here?"

"You say that like it's a bad thing. Besides, I put it on Steve's credit card."

"Steve's ..."

"Well, he already had the Social Security number."

Wilson sat numbly.

"Oh," he said after a while.

"S'okay. You don't know about that either." House's eyes brightened. "Hey, we're done!" With a flourish, he grabbed the last receipt from the box and scanned it. "Yep, we're done," he repeated.

"Wait, what's that one? Is it allowable?"

"It's nothing," House said. He moved to stuff the small slip of paper in his breast pocket; only to be stopped by a firm clasp on his arm.

"Are you sure? Come on, let me see it."

"Not necessary."

"Which means you don't _want_ me to see it." Wilson set his jaw grimly. "Come on, House, what is it? More Vicodin? Something stronger? _Syringes?_ Damn it, House, _what?"_

"None of those things! You're -- _ow!"_ His statement ended in an undignified yelp as Wilson caught his right hand and extracted the receipt with a none-too-gentle twist.

"I should've known you couldn't change. That the first chance out of rehab you'd be ordering --" Wilson's eyes widened. "Twenty-five pounds of _macadamia nuts?"_

"Told you you were wrong," House grumped.

Wilson looked at House, then back down at the receipt.

"Two hundred sixty-one dollars," he whispered. "And eighty-five cents."

"Includes shipping and handling."

"Of course." Wilson ran one thumb over the crinkly paper, straightening the edges. "House --"

"Pancakes," House said, and began to flip through the TV channels again.

"What?"

"Thought you might make those pancakes again. Sometime." House coughed a little. "Wanted to be prepared."

The channel surfing continued; Wilson watched silently as a man cleaning a large, ugly fish was replaced by CNN, only to be immediately followed in dizzying succession by a stock market report, a woman making lamb _vindaloo_ , and swordsmen battling across an animated map labeled "Visigoths" and "Gaul." The channel flipped again. "It's the stuff that dreams are made of," Sam Spade said to the police detective.

"So this isn't an allowable loss?" Wilson asked quietly.

House's eyes didn't move from the _The Maltese Falcon_.

"I was hoping it would turn out to be a capital gain," he replied.

Wilson made a vague, helpless gesture.

"But -- _twenty-five pounds?"_

House looked at him then, the corner of his mouth quirking up in the hint of a smile.

"You know me, Jimmy," he replied. "I've never been one for half-measures."

  
~ fin

  
 _NOTES:_

  
Supreme Reggie Rat Diet may be found [here](http://www.petsmart.com/global/product_detail.jsp?ASSORTMENT%3C%3East_id=2534374302023695&FOLDER%3C%3Efolder_id=2534374302047887&PRODUCT%3C%3Eprd_id=845524441780190).  
Carmen Luvana and her Love Bullet egg vibe are real, and may be found [here](http://www.bigsextoystore.com/cgi-bin/edatcat/BTSstore.cgi?user_action=detail&catalogno=A8201-7).  
"Ass Kickin' Wasabi Horseradish Hot Sauce" may be found [here](http://www.sweatnspice.com/154-6.htm).  
25-lb. containers of macadamia nuts may be found [here](http://www.hawnnut.com/roasandsalma.html).  
The full lyrics to _Taxman_ , by The Beatles, may be found [here](http://www.lyricsdomain.com/2/beatles/taxman.html).

I'm afraid I made up the _Horny Sluts in Hot Leather_ magazine, but it wouldn't surprise me at all if it were real also.

  



End file.
